European identity: lessons from 20 years of social psychological inquiry

Abstract

In this chapter I aim to explain why the project of a European identity failed to create a common feeling of belonging for people of different EU nations. I will draw on social psychological theories and research in relation to social representations, social identity and social influence to discuss how people dealt with the change that European integration produced. I will argue, first, that lay conceptions about European integration were developed in relation to national identity because membership of the EU was possible only through membership of one of the member-states. The consequence of the relationship between the attachment to the EU and national membership is threefold. First, national economic asymmetries conditioned the way citizens of the various countries identified with the EU. Second, citizens developed an instrumental attachment to the EU in relation to the perceived benefits for their country and for themselves from European integration. And third, because not everybody is able to benefit from EU integration, the diverse reception of the EU within nation-states depended on citizens’ socio-economic status. I will base these arguments on my own research with French and Greek nationals1 and on other social psychological empirical findings. In the second part of the chapter I will discuss why the proponents of EU integration aimed to create an affective sense of belonging and why the content given to this identity failed this project. Finally, I will conclude by suggesting that creating a superordinate identity is not a matter of perceived commonalities either in terms of symbols or in terms of values but of a new identity-project that gives new meaning to social relations.